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DELAYS THE BUGBEAR OF BEET TRANSPORT
Page 96
Page 97
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Contracts for the Forthcoming Season are Now Being Made: This is the Time to Devise Means for Diminishing Congestion
MOST hauliers are now arranging their contracts for sugar-beet haulage, or will be doing so in the near future. This is, therefore, a suitable opportunity to discuss the matter. The total tonnage of sugar-beet farmed is in the neighbourhood of 3,000,000. At least one-third of that quantity goes to the factory by road and that proportion tends—at present—to grow.
That is equivalent to an average of 100,000 tons of beet per week, sufficient to keep 1,000 5-6-ton lorries fully engaged throughout thegseason. (Unfortunately, and quite wrongly, smaller types of vehicle are largely employed and the number in use is considerably in excess of the -1,000 quoted above.) If 4s. per ton be taken as a basis for calculation, the revenue to the haulage industry in the sugar-beet season is £200,000 on that account alone, quite apart from supplementary income in payment for loads of wet and dry pulp and lime sludge.
A business of this magnitude is worth more than a passing thought ; it is worth serious, consideration, especially as there are signs that, unless some drastic improvement be made in the methods of those concerned in its operation, the road-transport industry is likely to lose some of its share.
Record Sugar-beet Acreage.
The acreage under sugar-beet in Great Britain to-day is in excess of that in any'previous years. Last season's crop constituted a record in respect of both tonnage and acreage. Last season, too, the delays experienced by hauliers delivering beet to many of the factories were also a record. Next season, unless something be done to improve mailers, these difficulties will be increased, to create another and an undesirable record.
am informed that one haulier arrived at a factory one day last season at 9 a.m, with a load of beet, and did not leave until 6.30 p.m. I do not believe the story, but am none the less impressed with the fact that it illustrates, even if it exaggerates, the situation as it then prevailed.
These conditions, the waiting in long queues af factories, involve loss to all concerned. If there were no such delays, sugar-beet haulage could be carried on at lower rates than at present, yet with greater profit to those who do the work. Farmers would benefit and so D42
.would the factories. It is, however, the hauliers who suffer a direct loss, but it is the factories and the farmers who will, if these difficulties continue, begin to consider whether they had better not make more use of the railways tor their beet. At the same time, the railway companies themselves are in close touch with the situation.
The initial cause of congestion is the eagerness of the haulier. His excessive anxiety to get ahead with the work produces effects which first bring about the congestion and then, by a species of vicious circle of causes and effects, aggravate it.
Only by realization of the manner of working can the situation be appreciated. A haulier enters into a contract with a farmer to haul his beet. To make the most of his opportunities during the season, heolust enter into as many contracts as his equipment will allow and, having done so, must work as hard as he can to get his tonnage into the factory. His difficulties are aggravated first by the fact that the farmer is apt to give him short notice that loads are available and -by receipt of advice of this description from several farmers simultaneously.
How Delays Occur.
His usual procedure is to go quickly to the nearest farm, load up and travel to the factory as early as possible in the morning. From 50 to 100 hauliers may do the same thing and all arrive at the factory more or less together, in readiness for the yard to open. A queue, of course, forms at once. If an average of three minutes per vehicle be taken as the time necessary to go s through the formalities at the factory, then the 60th of these hauliers will have, no alternative but to wait three hours before he has an opportunity of reaching the entrance gates.
Some of the drivers waiting in this queue, appreciating the certainty of at least an hour's delay, get into touch with their principals, advising them of the circumstances and recommending that additional vehicles be commissioned in order to clear the farmers' loads. That means that 150 lorries will shortly be on the road, where 100 or fewer would have sufficed for the amount of work that has to be done.
At some factories, when supplies of beet in any week. are sufficient for that week, they refuse to accept de liveries on Fridays and Saturdays. Hauliers know this and, to avoid the risk of being fOund on those days with loads to deliver and no opportunity of delivery, concentrate on getting as much suger-beet as possible to the factory early in the week. This still4further increases the congestion, the week's work being crowded into four days.
Too many hauliers use lorries too small to be profitable and too small from the point ol view of congestion. The time to deliver a load of beet does not vary 'much as between 2 tons and 6 tons, but three tinies as many 2-ton lorries are needed as 6-tonners (for a given tonnage).
One effect of these difficulties has been to drive responsible contractors to abandon this form of haulage. lirins of standing, acquainted with the economics of haulage, and knowing the effect, on cost, of protracted delays, have realized that to continue would only be to
work at a loss. They have, therefore, withdrawn, thus increasing, by their detection, the proportion of irresponsible operators.
How Congpstion May be Remedied.
Now to consider the remedy. There are three parties to the contract, namely, the farmer, the haulier and the factory. The farmer is helpless. He is concerned in the matter, as I have shown, because if these difficulties be eliminated, his beet will cost him less to deliver, but he cannot usefully interfere.
I have, from time to time, urged that the hauliers who are 'engaged in this business should themselves get -toiether and enter into some arrangement to obviate congestion, but have come to the conclusion that there is no possibility of such action. There are too many of what I might term the guerrilla type of haulier engaged in this business, for there to be any prospect of organization amongst them. They do not belong to any associa tion and, moreover, are jealous of any suggestion for amendment which comes from a competitor., I am forced to the conclusion, therefore, that, apart from any possible outcome of the operation of the Road and Rail Traffic Act, the only help can come from the factories. They, however, must not intervene directly. They are not really parties to the actual contracts for haulage, I do not think that any scheme of registration of hauliers by the factories `a method Which has been suggested to me—would be acceptable. But I do know that the factories could eliminate much of the congestion if they would improve and rigidly apply the system of permits.
A Factory that Serves as an Example. The one factory where there is least congestion is that of Felstead, Essex. I have, in an article which appeared-rin the issue of The Commercial Motor dated' Ja.suary 26, 1934, described the permit system which is there in force.'
I suggest that the various branches of the Road Haulage Association located in the beet-growing areas should themselves approach the factories and ask that the Fe!stead system be applied. I am sure that if they do so the outcome will be a considerable reduction in the delays experienced at the factories during the height of
the season. S.T.R.